Review by Ian Keogh

Unlike some graphic novels marketed as being King in Black tie-ins, everything here actually does connect rather than being an excuse to tie up plots featuring characters whose titles have been cancelled.

Gwen Stacy originated on another world, and combined with a suit of alien slime combats crime as Ghost Spider. When god of alien symbiotes Knull invades Earth the otherworldly status of her suit means it’s somehow resistant to his control.

That’s convenient for her, but the sort of element on which superhero stories thrive. However, Seanan McGuire pulls a couple more tricks from the same hat, making this collection’s lead story contrived. It’s a (contrived) surprise in-story, so without revealing who it is, the Carnage mentioned in the title isn’t Cletus Kassidy, but is equally savage and with viable resentments.

McGuire supplies Gwen with convincing narrative captions, but further diminishing credibility is the actual dialogue can be that of a sociopath. If you’d just seen your three flatmates killed would your first response be a joke?

Rico Renzi’s vivid colouring gives Flaviano’s art the look of skateboard culture, very bright and exaggerated with multiple pink threads eye-catching. Ig Guara draws scenes set in the past in a more traditional way. The past informs the present, and battles in several locations eventually lead to an inconclusive ending.

Clay McLeod Chapman and Garry Brown follow the main event by featuring Scream hunting down Demogoblin. It’s all action, all the way, but filler and the art’s plain ugly, which is the opposite of Michele Bandini’s emotionally strong pages for the following Spider-Man story. That’s written by Jed MacKay and is by some distance the star turn. It explores why Spider-Man is a hero and an inspiration, via the simple task of trying to get an old lady home in a city infested with symbiotes under Knull’s control.

However, that and a brief epilogue drawn by Alberto Alburquerque are around 20% of an otherwise very poor collection. An alternative is to buy the main feature and all tie-ins as the King in Black Omnibus.